


Flu and Fogginess

by DarkNymfa



Series: DP Ficlet Collection [6]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Ficlet, Gen, Identity Reveal, Sick Character, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:34:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24238906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkNymfa/pseuds/DarkNymfa
Summary: Since when do half-ghosts get sick?
Series: DP Ficlet Collection [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1749379
Comments: 4
Kudos: 152





	1. Fog

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt was "fog" for shadowofaghost5 on Tumblr. Also here's a reminder that I'm open for prompts on my Tumblr (darks-ink) pretty much always. Even if I'm not open right that moment, I save them up for a later moment.  
> Also I'm sick and miserable so of course I wrote Danny also being sick.

The shrill beeping of an alarm clock startled Danny awake. He swung out his arm in its general direction, hoping to hit the snooze button.

A sound like plastic crunching sounded instead, and the beeping went up another pitch before it cut out.

Confused by the strange noise, Danny opened his eyes with a groan. He lifted up his hand, bits of plastic still clinging to it. On his nightstand laid the remains of his alarm clock – shattered into pieces.

He sat up, hoping to inspect it closer.

Instead he suddenly grew dizzy, toppling out of his bed-

but never hitting the floor. Instead he floated several inches above it.

“What?” he croaked out. Then suddenly his flight quit again and he thumped onto the floor.

Footsteps approached his door, and Jazz’s voice rung out. “Danny, are you alright?”

“Uh,” he answered, intending to answer properly. Instead he sneezed, closing his eyes in the motion.

When he opened them again half his room was covered in ice.

“Danny?” Jazz asked again, thumping her fist on his door.

“I uh. You should come in.” He sniffled, halfheartedly wiping his nose on the sleeve of his pajamas. He froze up when he spotted the faintly glowing mucus on it.

The door opened and closed. Jazz sighed. “Danny, did you forget to release the cold from your core again?”

“No!” he protested. He tried to push himself upright again, but the wooziness took over again and he fell onto his side instead. His arm flailed out, trying to catch himself on the wall.

It phased through instead.

“Are you _sick_?” Jazz asked somewhat incredulously. “I thought your enhanced healing stopped most illnesses?”

“Maybe it’s a ghost sickness?” Danny offered, pulling his arm out of the wall again. It stubbornly refused to go tangible again. He was strongly reminded of the first few months after the Accident, when he struggled to control his powers.

And he had _so_ hoped to be over that.

Jazz crouched next to him and laid a hand on his forehead. She frowned. “You feel warmer than normal. I think you might have a fever.”

“Of _course_ ,” Danny groaned, rolling onto his back again. His head felt foggy and thick.

“You should probably stay home today.” Jazz grabbed his arm, clearly intending to pull him up onto his feet. “If you go down for breakfast mom and dad will probably agree.”

“Probably,” Danny agreed, letting himself be pulled onto his feet. He closed his eyes to rub in them once more, blindly following Jazz’s guidance.

They stopped at the top of the stairs, and he opened his eyes again. As much as he trusted Jazz, he didn’t quite feel safe going down the stairs blind. Especially not with how terrible he was feeling.

“Danny, your eyes,” Jazz hissed, and he glanced up at her. He could see the glowing green of his eyes reflected in her pupils.

“Oh,” he simply said. He blinked, slowly, but the color remained. “That’s… a problem.”

“Can you still use your powers on command?”

“Maybe.” He frowned at her. “Why though?”

“Your eyes turn blue when you’re using your ice powers,” she explained.

Before he could react, however, footsteps sounded from the bottom of the stairs.

“Danny honey, why are you still in your pajamas?”

His eyes automatically snapped towards her, and she visibly flinched a step back. He guessed that they hadn’t stopped glowing, then.

Jazz’s hand landed on his shoulder, and he looked at her. She looked concerned but determined. She nodded, once, at him. Then she called down the stairs at their mom.

“Danny is sick. He should stay home from school today.”

“Jazz,” his mother answered, voice cautious. “Step away from him. He’s overshadowed.”

Danny would’ve made some attempt to defend himself, but a wave of nausea hit him and he gripped the railing of the stairs to stop himself from falling. The metal groaned under his fingers, before a hissing noise sounded.

“Danny!” Jazz hissed, and he opened his eyes again ( _when had he closed them?_ ) to see ectoplasmic energy forming around his hands.

He yelped and released the railing again, staggering backwards. His back landed on the far wall, his head hitting the wall a little too hard. He groaned – the pain combined rather badly with his foggy mind.

“Jazz, get away from him!” His mom sounded far closer, and Danny opened his eyes to see her halfway up the stairs – and getting closer.

“Mom, no!” Jazz yelled, stepping in front of him.

Vaguely he thought that he should probably be worried about all of this. He was sure that _normally_ he would be all over this-

But his brain refused to cooperate. It felt like he was wading through a thick soup instead of actual thoughts.

“Jazz,” their mother warned again, now stepping onto the upper floor. The ecto-gun in her hand was gripped tightly, but not raised yet. Maybe she didn’t want to risk hitting Jazz? Also, where did that gun even _come_ from?

“No mom,” Jazz snapped back, arms spread wide. “You don’t get it! You’re just scaring him!”

“That’s a ghost, not your brother!” Maddie took another step closer, and Danny vaguely thought that he should probably leave.

Instead he just sunk to the ground, back pressed against the wall.

Jazz glanced at him, eyes blown wide and brimming with… some sort of emotion. He was pretty sure he was _supposed_ to know what it was, but his brain wasn’t cooperating.

Then she looked at their mother again, pushing back her shoulders and straightening out her posture. “No mom, you don’t get it. The ghost _is_ Danny.”

Maddie faltered, her expression muddled- too muddled for Danny to read. “What… What do you mean?”

Danny opened his mouth to contribute, even if he wasn’t sure what to say- but instead he sneezed. Again.

“Gesundheit,” Jazz said, grimacing. Their mom had jumped to the side at the last minute, and had thus escaped the onslaught of ice that now covered the entire top of the stairs.

Danny wiped his nose on his sleeve again, before looking for his mom. “Thanks,” he muttered, finally spotting his mom. She looked like she was fine. But better safe than sorry, right? “Mom, are you okay?”

She looked at him, her gaze sharp and inspecting. “What if I wasn’t?”

He flinched, hitting his head against the wall again. Hissing through his teeth, he rubbed the back of his head. “Sorry. I didn’t feel it coming.”

Jazz crouched next to him again, reaching out to test his temperature again. Her hand passed through his head though.

“Danny,” she chastised. “I can’t check your temp like this.”

“Sorry,” he said again. He knew he had to focus to become tangible again, but his foggy mind refused. “I can’t control it.”

Maddie approached them again, an uncertain expression of her face. The gun was still in her hand, but she kept it turned away from the two of them for the moment.

“Has this happened before?” Her voice was worried, but he wasn’t sure if it was because she believed them, or if she was just worried about the ghost somehow damaging his body.

“Sometimes when he gets new powers he can’t control them,” Jazz confessed, swiping at Danny once more- and once more passing through him. “But I think it’s this sickness that’s making him lose control.”

“And when I first got em,” Danny contributed, mumbling the words. “I kept going intangible and invisible.”

“Right, I wasn’t really around for that.” Jazz finally managed to grab onto Danny. She grimaced again. “You definitely have a fever."

“But _how_?” Maddie asked, looking like she was considering testing his temperature too. “How is Danny a ghost?”

“’m only half,” he grumbled before suddenly shivering. A cloud of blue vapor emerged from his mouth. Recognizing it as his ghost sense he groaned.

“What are the chances that that was a false alarm?” Jazz asked, quirking an eyebrow at him. “Actually, never mind. Knowing your luck it wasn’t.” She stood up and pulled Maddie up as well.

“What was-” Maddie started, but Jazz shushed her.

“ _That_ was his ghost sense. There is a ghost somewhere nearby. You go catch it, and I’ll get Danny back in bed so he can get better. After that I’ll explain everything, okay?”

Their mom eyed them for a moment longer before nodding. “Alright.” She ruffled Danny’s hair, looking strangely contemplative. “But I want the _whole_ story.”

“Of course,” the siblings chorused.


	2. Flu

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danny gets the ghost flu but shows up at school anyways

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Might've been sitting on this prompt since fricking March or something, whoops. Prompt was "Danny gets the ghost flu but shows up at school anyways" by an anonymous asker on Tumblr.

“You look terrible, dude,” was the first thing Tucker said to Danny when he got to school. It was followed up almost immediately by, “What’s wrong with you, man, not in public!”

Which, of course, was a response to the ectoblast Danny had inadvertently send in Tucker’s direction.

“S’rry,” he mumbled, sniffling miserably. “’m not doing it on purpose.”

“Wow.” Tucker frowned, leaning in closer, a worried expression on his face. “Are you okay? I thought you couldn’t get sick?”

“So did I.” He dragged his hand over his eyes, but the crusty feeling and sleepiness remained. “Jazz and my mom think it might be some kinda ghost flu.”

Tucker stiffened. Then he grabbed Danny by the shoulders, staring straight into his eyes. “Wait, your _mom_? Is this like, the way she and your dad blame everything on ghosts, or…”

“Tuck.” Danny swatted the hand off of his shoulder, turning to attempt to unlock his locker. “I literally can’t control my powers. What do you think?”

“Man, and you got through that? That’s pretty impressive.”

“Jazz talked me out of that mess, I guess.” Danny jangled the lock, frustrated. It wouldn’t open for some reason.

Then it crunched, and he swiftly withdrew his hand to see that he had accidentally crushed it.

“That’s kind of a problem, man.” Tucker pried the destroyed piece of metal out of Danny’s hand, looking it over. “You have no control over _any_ of your powers?”

“They just kind of activate whenever, yeah.” At least his locker was open now. Danny took out the books he would need, ignoring the obvious problem for the moment. “The sneezes are the worst. I may or may not have frozen my entire room when I sneezed.”

“Oof.” Tucker looked at the lock in his hand, shrugged, then placed it in Danny’s locker. “So why’re you here, then? Wouldn’t it be smarter to stay home, if it has already given you away to your mom?”

“She thought I couldn’t afford to miss school,” he grumbled, attempting to rub the sleep out of his eyes again, to no avail. “Jazz couldn’t convince her, either. Thinks she might need some time alone to process, or something.”

“I mean, that would make sense,” Tucker allowed with another shrug. “But, come on. You look miserable, dude. Lancer’ll take one look at you and send you to the nurse, never mind if you sneeze and freeze half the classroom.”

“What’s this about Danny freezing the school?” Sam asked, leaning against the locker next to Danny’s. “That doesn’t seem like a good use of your powers.”

Danny sniffled again, attempting to stamp down on an upcoming sneeze. Then he realized that sneezing into his locker might actually be one of the safer opportunities at the moment.

“Cover me,” he said, instead of answering Sam’s question.

And, in a convincing show of their loyalty, they did so immediately. Both leaned in closer, hiding him from the rest of the hallway with their bodies.

He stuffed his head into his locker. Took a moment to appreciate how much roomier it was inside when it was just his head inside. Then the sneeze came upon him, and with a momentous force, he let it go.

Looking back, he supposed it made sense that his Ghostly Wail could _also_ be triggered by sneezing. In the moment, however, he couldn’t help but think that the universe must really _really_ hate him.

Thankfully it had only lasted a short time, so the damage wasn’t _too_ bad. The walls of his locker had dented outwards, bending the lockers that neighbored it on all sides.

“Danny,” Sam’s voice was tight, controlled, “What is going on?”

“Sick,” he mumbled, pulling his head out of the locker again. Looks like he would need a new one. Maybe he could blame the damage on a ghost fight? Or a misfiring invention from his parents? “Ghost flu, or something.”

“Okay.” She nodded, folding her hands together. “So then please explain to me _why you’re here_?”

“His mom made him go,” Tucker explained, taking mercy on Danny. “She found out his secret, apparently, and not even Jazz could stop her from sending Danny to school.”

She shook her head, but hummed. “Wow. That’s, um. That sucks, Danny.”

“Uh huh. Tell me about it.” He sniffled again, then winced as the bell rung. “Well, here goes nothing, I suppose.”

“Lancer will send you to the nurse the moment he sees you.” Sam gestured at him. “You really look terrible.”

“That’s what I said, too!” Tucker exclaimed as they started making their way to the classroom. “Both of those things, even.”

“Not much I can do about it.” Danny sniffled once more. He made a face like he was about to sneeze, then stamped it down again. It was too busy in the hallway, he couldn’t chance it. “Not my problem.”

“ _Definitely_ your problem,” Sam protested, “If it outs your secret. Come on, Danny, just leave like you always do.”

“Can’t.” A wave of nausea washed over him, and he paused to let it pass. He ducked his head in his elbow, only barely peeking over it to look at Sam and Tucker. “Gotta stay in Mom’s good graces.”

“Danny, no offense, but your eyes are _literally_ glowing.” Tucker sighed, looking away briefly as if making sure no one was paying attention to them. They weren’t, thankfully, as the trio were protected by their lackluster reputation. “There is no way you’re getting out of this without blowing your identity out of the water.”

“Unless,” Sam said, snapping her fingers, eyes big, “we say he got overshadowed. We can say that Danny has good mental strength and is fighting off the possession, but sometimes the ghost surfaces enough to mess with its powers.”

Danny sighed, shook his head, and straightened up again. “How’s me being sick related to that?”

“Your body is trying to fight off an attacking entity in the only way it knows?” Sam shrugged. “It’s better than just blowing your secret, isn’t it?”

“Ugh.” He made a face, hoping to make it clear what he thought of this. “Yeah, I mean, I guess. Whatever. I’m blaming you if it goes wrong.”


End file.
